On May 11, Sequim Middle School student Sean Weber attended the International Science and Engineering Fair in Los Angeles, Calif., as a student observer.

Weber was one of four students from the United States that were included in a group of 23 students from around the world. The student delegates represented Australia, Canada, China, Finland, India, Israel, Japan, Mexico, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, United Kingdom and the United States. They participated in the five-day “Broadcom MASTERS International 2014” program that promotes project-based learning as a means of developing skills for future scientists and engineers.

On the second day of the fair, Weber and other middle school students attended the opening ceremonies with more than 1,780 ISEF high school student participants from 70 countries to meet with professional engineers and scientist at the Broadcom offices, visit a 3-D printing lab at the University of California at Irvine, take a one-kilowatt hour challenge (an obstacle course of four stations: hot air pong, X-box gaming, baking and a movie screening also at the University of California at Irvine) and learn about the power consumption of everyday consumer electronics.

On the third day the students toured the Disney Studios in Burbank, visited the Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits and played games and danced at the Club Nokia at L.A. LIVE (a sports and entertainment district in downtown Los Angeles).

On day four they visited the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, toured Universal Studios in Hollywood and helped the ISEF students practice for their interviews.

On the fifth day the Broadcom MASTERS middle school student observers had an opportunity to talk to the ISEF high school students at their projects. On the sixth day, Weber and the other student observers attended the Grand Award ceremony, in which ISEF winners from each category were announced as well as the top overall winners.

This year, 15-year-old Nathan Han of Boston won the Gordon E. Moore Award of $75,000 for developing a machine learning software tool to study mutations of a gene linked to breast cancer. Han was a Broadcom MASTERS finalist in 2011, when Sequim student Katherine Landoni presented her middle school project and was given the STEM award for Engineering.

Weber was selected as one of two Rising Stars on Oct. 13, 2013, at the Broadcom MASTERS (Math, Applied Science, Technology and Engineering for Rising Stars) which is funded by the Broadcom Foundation. The Society for Science and the Public also administers both the Broadcom MASTERS and ISEF.